Riyadh bombing Yemen on behalf of US, Israel: Iran official

Saudi Arabia has launched a proxy war against Yemen on behalf of the United States and Israel, a senior Iranian military official says.

“The war the Saudis have launched against Yemen is a proxy war on behalf of the United States, the Zionist regime [of Israel], and their western allies,” said Major General Yahya Rahim Safavi, a top military adviser to Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei.

Elaborating on the way the US and its allies instigate violence in other countries, the Iranian official added that they do not involve themselves in the fights directly and entrust the task to “some countries or some terrorist groups.”

He also said, “In the past 15 years, attacking the Islamic nations and countries and introducing Islam and Muslims as a new threat have been among the objectives and plans of the Zionists, Americans and Europeans.”

“Targeting Muslim nations and countries as well as their strategic resources and their thoughts have been among the goals of the wars in the past 15 years in the region,” Safavi added.

“Dominating Islamic countries, appointing dependent puppet rulers and dominating the oil resources of the countries are among other objectives of the wars in the region,” he stressed.

He further explained that the West seeks to launch wars in the region in order to sell weapons, saying, “There should be a war so that the producers of weapons can sell their arms. In the past few years, over hundreds of billions of dollars worth of weapons have been sold to the Arab countries.”

“Saudi Arabia is the largest purchaser of arms, and especially the weapons produced by the US and the Israeli regime,” Safavi highlighted.

He stressed that the US and Israel aim to weaken the countries in the region, adding, “Breaking up Islamic countries is high on the agenda of the US and Zionists.”

Saudi Arabia started military aggression against Yemen on March 26 - without a UN mandate - in a bid to undermine the Houthi Ansarullah movement, which currently controls the capital Sana’a and other major provinces, and to restore power to Yemen’s fugitive former president, Abd Rabbuh Mansour Hadi, who is a staunch ally of Riyadh.

The Saudi military campaign has reportedly claimed the lives of over 1,400 people so far and injured thousands of others. Hundreds of women and children are among the victims, according to the UN.

The Al Saud regime has imposed a blockade on the delivery of relief supplies to the war-stricken people in defiance of calls by international aid groups.